


August Writing Challenge: 31 Characters in 31 Days

by littlesunshinelily



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, I'm gonna have fun, but eh, but if they stray into them i'll put up tags, i'm gonna try to keep things out of Bad Topics, idk if anyone beyond my friends are gonna read, writing challenge
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-02
Updated: 2018-08-07
Packaged: 2019-06-20 09:13:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15531015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlesunshinelily/pseuds/littlesunshinelily
Summary: My boyfriend's sister created a writing challenge. I'm going to attempt it on top of DR:S. Will I fail horribly? Probably. Check it out if you like to see writers be disasters.





	1. 1. Home Environment [Maemi Akemi]

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. Describe your character’s home environment in a way that you understand the character. This can be during a morning routine, them throwing a party, etc.
> 
> If anybody else is curious, the rest of the challenge is here: http://electric-fate-blog.tumblr.com/post/176464589430/august-writing-challenge-31-characters-in-31-days
> 
> I'm a little late by Australian standards for this one, oops. I am busy with uni and travelling, though.

The sunlight streamed in through a wide window, slipping through the cracks of peach-coloured curtains and illuminating a strip of Maemi's face. 

 

Maemi flinched, ducking her head beneath her pillow and making a zombie-like groan. The curtains were supposed to make the light warm, not stream a bright strip right in her eyes as soon as the sun decided to come above the horizon. 

It wasn't long, however, before her alarm clock began to beep, signalling the arrival of 6am. Sighing, Maemi tucked the pillow back under her head and sat up, swinging her legs around and out of bed. She still gave the sun a nasty squint - looking as though she was debating on whether or not to try and kill it, no matter how fruitless the endeavour. 

She was in the bathroom before she'd properly processed walking down the hallway to it. It wasn't until she'd splashed cold water onto her half-asleep and somehow unsuspecting face that her brain caught up with her body. As she looked up, she saw droplets dripping off a fairly cute face, in her own opinion. And dripping off several sections of crimson hair, namely her fringe. Maemi sighed, drying her face on the nearest towel and grabbing for her hairbrush. 

One would think her hair was difficult to put up, and the first few times, it probably would be. But for Maemi, the bun-tails she wore were easy to put up after the thousand-or-so times she had that it came naturally. Brush hair of all its knots, wrap hair around itself a few times, tuck the pigtail underneath, tie it into place. Repeat for the other side. The only thing that was out of place, was that damn one piece of hair that seemed to never grow longer, never want to obey the laws of gravity, and no matter how much hair gel, hairspray, or any other hair product she could put on it to try and get it to just  _stay the fuck down,_  just continued to poof up like some sort of human TV antenna.

Makeup was not an unheard concept to Maemi, but enough to clear her face up was about all she decided she needed. With that, she slipped into her uniform - somewhat unconventional for a high school with its lack of a blazer, instead opting for its female student body to wear a peach-coloured vest with burgundy trims. A vest that could honestly be mistaken for a tank top, if not for the puffy-sleeved blouse worn underneath with buttons matching the trim of the vest, the socks, and the skirt. Not a very long skirt, but Maemi didn't seem to mind. Slipping on her indoor shoes, Maemi headed downstairs for breakfast. 

 

The smell of cooking egg let her know, for once, her mother was home before she walked to school.

Maemi gave her mother a warm smile, the fatigue of fifteen minutes ago barely a thought in her mind. "Morning, mum..."

Her mother offered her a glance and a smile of her own - bright for her daughter, but showing the buildup of stress from a single woman working a full-time job to support the small household. "Maemi, good morning!"

Barely a second after her greeting and without an opportunity to ask how Maemi felt this morning, a standard ringtone began playing from her mother's right pocket. 

"Can you keep an eye on the eggs and rice? I just need to take this call," her mother said. Dutifully, Maemi took the phone as her mother left the kitchen for the conversation - though not before the sound of her boss' voice began to talk through an accidentally-left-on speaker setting. 

"Mineko! Listen, construction begins at-" was all Maemi got from the conversation as Mineko left into the living room. Maemi looked at her mum with a smile, before turning back to the boiling rice and cooking egg. A simple breakfast, but if given a drizzle of soy sauce, it would surely be tasty. 

As the conversation seemed to be taking a while to finish, Maemi noticed that there was a good chance everything would burn if Mineko didn't come back pretty much in the next twenty seconds. Biting her lip and taking things into her own hands, Maemi quickly took the eggs off the heat and pulled the rice away from the oven altogether, grabbing a strainer on the way as she went to the sink. Quickly straining the rice, she placed the pot in the sink for the time being and took out a pair of rice moulds. Pouring about half of the rice into each, she left the two there as she grabbed out a couple of plates. 

As she tipped the rice moulds onto each of the plates, Mineko came back into the kitchen. 

"Ehe... uh, sorry if this isn't what you were thinking, mum," Maemi chuckled nervously, taking the rice moulds off and leaving neat rice piles. 

"It's quite alright. I only have about twenty minutes before I need to go, so you put the eggs on," Mineko added.

"Is there any soy sauce?" Maemi's question was filled with optimism.

"That's why I'm going to the fridge," Mineko chuckled, pulling out a bottle as Maemi slipped the cooked egg onto the rice. Mineko frowned as the dark liquid in the bottle barely filled up a quarter. "... We will need more soon, though..."

"Sorry, I can't help the fact it's tasty..." Maemi said. "Like strawberry candies."

"I know, but don't have too much of either. It's not good for you," Mineko replied, drizzling soy sauce on top of the eggs and taking both plates in her hands.

 

Soon, Maemi and Mineko sat at the table, a plate in front of both of them. Despite not feeling particularly ravenous, Mineko was quick with her eating. 

Maemi, on the other hand, paced herself - though not out of concern for her health. Her mind was focused on a photo on the wall - one showing a much younger-looking Mineko, with long brown hair lacking the peppered-in silver hairs, and a smooth face almost identical to Maemi's own, right down to the warm glow of her light brown eyes, without the wrinkles of stress and age. In her arms was a young toddler with soft, crimson hair and the same set of eyes, wide in wonder and hope for the world around her.

Maemi turned to her mother and asked, "Who was my dad?"

Mineko shook her head, placing her chopsticks on the plate. "I wish you'd stop asking that..." 

"Sorry." Maemi picked at her food with even less enthusiasm than before. 

"... Yoshida Akemi," Mineko said. "I took his last name, he took my virginity, and when I said I wanted to raise you, he took off." 

"... Died in a car crash?" Maemi guessed. 

"If only he died somehow." Mineko's voice took on a bitter tone. Before Maemi could voice her offense, Mineko continued. "Took half of what we owned, some of it mine, and left, supposedly to go to the United States. He didn't even say goodbye to you."

Maemi lowered her head, taking another bite of her food, apologetic for asking and feeling the onset of an anxiety attack, desperately looking for anything to distract herself. "Sorry."

"It's not your fault," Mineko said, though Maemi could tell it was just said to make her feel better. It was a direct contradiction, after all. 

"I heard the new Hope's Peak is scouting its next year's students soon," Mineko changed the topic, giving a grin. "Maybe your shadow-puppeteering will pay off!" 

Maemi let out a snort at that. "Hope's Peak? Scouting someone who makes shadow puppets? You've lost it, mum."

"You never know." Mineko shoved the last bite in her mouth, before heading towards the garage. "Make sure you're at school on time, honey."

"I will..." Maemi said, in the same tone as every other teenager would say the same thing. 

 

It was another five minutes before Maemi finished her food, at which she elected to do the dishes so her mum wouldn't have to when she finally got home. Rolling up her sleeves, she washed the two plates, the frypan, the rice pot - even the moulds. 

"Hope's Peak... hah. After taking on the Ultimate Ringleader, Ultimate Figure Skater, and Ultimate Journalist, why would they take on a shadow puppeteer?" Maemi said to herself as the water drained from the sink. Drying her hands, she rolled her sleeves back down. Heading back to the fridge with her bag, she placed a bento box prepared the previous night into it. Checking her skirt pocket to make sure the keys were in it, she headed towards the door, swapping her indoor shoes for outdoor ones and placing her indoor shoes in her bag as well. As she left the house and went onto the street, heading towards her school, she couldn't help but remember her mother's reply. 

"You never know."


	2. 2. Bad Habits [Kokuro Shiroko]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 2\. What’s a bad habit that your character has? What have they done to stop? Does anyone make fun of it or point it out?

“Again? When’d this even-“

            Kokuro shook her head, knowing she wouldn’t get an answer for the fuchsia stream running down her left hand from a cut in her skin.

Wiping the blood away with a tissue, noting that some of it had dried at the edges, she assessed the damage. It seemed to be a fairly superficial cut – more blood than harm. Of course, assessing that was difficult when barely any pain registered for her at all.

Hypoalgesia was usually considered a symptom rather than a disorder, but not one doctor she’d seen regarding it had been able to tell her just what the bloody hell was causing it. By this point, she’d just accepted that accidentally injuring herself and not knowing about it was going to be a part of her life. So long as she didn’t snap her wrist during a performance, she figured she’d be fine.

Forgoing the tissue this time, too loaded with blood to avoid just smearing it elsewhere, Kokuro wound up licking her wound of the newly-seeping blood the second time around. Curiosity of how it tasted had long ago faded – now it was just a way of stopping herself from smearing blood all over the place before she could find some actual antiseptics, an unfortunate side effect of her condition.

 

“How’s it taste today, Kuroshiro?” Kokuro glanced up towards the ceiling, finding one of her colleagues hanging from it, their feet around a line of pipes.  

Kokuro responded by grabbing tightly onto their ponytail with her non-injured hand and giving a hard pull. Despite the suddenness and silence of her actions, punctuated by only a pouty frown, they still managed to not only not break their neck, but land on their feet.

“ _Cmoooon_ , Kuroshiro. Doesn’t hurt to answer the question, does it?”

“Go fuck yourself, Samekuchi.”

“Samekuchi” held their hands up defensively, a smile across their face. “You just _know_ Tsukimo’s gonna have a fit if you get your dress dirty.”

“Between you and me, Aoki, let him have a damn fit.” Kokuro pushed herself up onto a table.

“Only if you tell me how the blood tastes,” Aoki said with a smile.

Kokuro rolled her eyes, wiping away the recent excess with her finger. “… You ever stuck a copper pipe in that bloody mouth of yours?”

“If it can fit in a human mouth and isn’t fatal within two years, I’ve put it in mine.” Aoki sat next to her, resting a foot on it as well.

“Tastes like a copper pipe. Or-“

“How do _you_ know what a copper pipe tastes like, Kuroshiro?”

“… **Or** how I imagine a copper pipe tastes, based on how they smell- Oi!”

Kokuro’s protest came about as soon as Aoki put her finger in their mouth.

“That’s bloody disgusting, what the fuck!”

“… Yaaagh, yeegh terrig de truuhh.”

“Of course I am. Now get my finger out of your bloody mouth!”

 

Aoki did as they were told and pulled away, a large grin on their face. “Man, Tsukimo would have my head for that.”

“Don’t plan on telling him if you don’t,” Kokuro replied. “Getting to the first aid kit without him noticing’s gonna be the hard part.”

“He expects you. He doesn’t expect me,” Aoki’s grin somehow became even wider, and Kokuro sometimes wondered whether their grin would detach from their face like some kind of cartoon. “Sooo, I’ll be _right back_ with the bandages and antiseptic.”

“And some water to dilute it, okay?” Kokuro said, though Aoki had already slipped off the table and headed towards the door.

Kokuro sighed, resting her head on her hands as she waited for their return.


	3. 3. An Argument (Delawyn Fukui

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Your character is in an argument with another character. How do they handle it? Will they bring it into the open or simmer on it?

The exclamations of frustration rang through the walls of the house and into Delawyn’s room, overtaking the noise level of her headphones and the American pop music blasting through them.

Couldn’t her parents just abandon that new MMO expansion for an hour?

Delawyn took her headphones off and set her CD player aside, getting to her feet to confront her parents. She scratched at an itch on her smooth lips as she raised her remaining hand, grabbing onto the doorhandle and pushing the door open. As she closed the door behind her and headed down the hall. Though in present day it rarely stretched below her shoulders, her hair at one point had nearly reached her knees. Curly, long, and still bright ginger, it bounced with every stomp Delawyn took towards the computer room. If not for the booming bass line of the background music, they would’ve been audible.

Pushing open the room’s door, she could see the faint glow of the computer monitor and hear metal slashing across skin – though those sounds were almost drowned out by her parents giving remarks about what was happening on-screen. Her father in Japanese, her mother in English, with some overlap between the two. Some words she was just too young to understand, but their inflection gave Delawyn a general idea of what those words meant.

Delawyn had barely opened her mouth to speak before the black-clad rogue on screen once again slid off the side of a dungeon wall and into the abyss below, the screen reading “YOU ARE DEAD” in bright red.

“You can’t even scale a wall with this kit?!” her mother yelled, shaking her head. “What’s even the point?!”

“The -2 nerf to your armour class by picking Bounty Hunter! It makes a huge difference between life and death!” her father retorted, gesturing towards the screen.

“Not according to these damn pits! I told you, we should’ve picked the Bounty Hunter class for the dungeon, not the standard Assassin!”

Assassin class. Assassin in general was a word Delawyn heard her parents use a lot. Often in the rare occasions they’d mention her without mentioning food or education, and even then. She wasn’t naïve enough to believe there was no purpose behind it, or even have no idea what that purpose was. They didn’t seem interested that she spoke two languages as fluently as most kids did one at nine years old, nor that she seemed to be stronger than almost all her classmates and definitely one of the fastest.

“Could you keep it down?” Delawyn asked, finally raising her voice. Both of her parents turned around, with her father running over and gripping her under her arms.

“She snuck up on us!” he said, glancing back at her mom as he lifted her into the air, even as Delawyn’s face went from a sleepy frown to a clearly annoyed scowl. “That’s our girl. She’ll be our little rogue in no time!”

“I’m serious, dad,” Delawyn replied, folding her arms.

“You’re gonna have to learn to enjoy the noise,” her mother interjected with a grin, as her father finally put her back on the floor. “If you wanna be successful, that is.”

“I don’t. I want to be able to listen to my music.” Delawyn continued her thoughts verbally without intending to. “I want to be able to spend time with you, too.”

“We know, honey. But the expansion only came out last week,” her father continued. “We’re still playing with it.”

“That’s fine, but can you just stop yelling at it for a little while?” Delawyn scratched the back of her head.

“This isn’t an easy segment,” her mother said. “Would be easier if **someone** just took the damn Bounty Hunter class!”

“We’d cross pits easier just to die to the monsters on the other side!”

“Can you please just stop yelling? I just want to listen to music for a little while!”

“Then leave the house! Go to the park, across town, wherever, I don’t care, neither does your father! We’re busy right now!”

 

Twenty minutes later, Delawyn was sitting up in a tree in the local park, her CD player resting on her ribcage as she lay in one of the higher branches. Leaves as orange as her hair were bound to become stuck within it, but for a short while before either the sun disappeared over the western horizon, or she got bored and decided to head off, or even if the police noticed there was a nine-year-old hanging out in a tree with no parental supervision in sight… there would be some peace.

She wouldn’t know what her future held. Whether she’d be able to grow up as a normal student in any sense of the word. Whether her parent’s obsession with those MMOs and creating a “real” MMO character would work. Whether she’d be able to keep her empathy and humanity intact. Many questions nine-year-olds aren’t pressed with regularly, or even at all.

But for now, as orange leaves fell gently along the cooling breeze, there was peace.


	4. 4. Unreliable Narrator [Nobody]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Write a character sketch in first person, specifically in an unreliable narrator style.

[I was unable to come up with a sketch that would not inadvertently reveal spoilers for Danganronpa S. I'm sorry.]


	5. 5. Coping Mechanisms (Kadiri Nakashima)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What is your character’s go-to coping mechanism? This can be either healthy or unhealthy. Describe how they indulge in it.

“I don’t care, Momoka.”

“Fuck’s sake, Kadiri- it wouldn’t kill you _to_ care!”

 

Two ultimates working on a film together should have been the collaboration of the era. The Ultimate Actress and Ultimate Director, both behind some of the most impressive films in Japan, should have produced a magnum opus on both parties’ parts.

Instead, it was producing countless arguments, from what coffee was sent to the two girls, to how the big emotional scene just before the climax should be done.

“I told you, a masterful film technique is to not show your face, have you stay silent, and let the audience infer your emotions based on the scene’s context!” Momoka said, using her hands to articulate and emphasise her words.

“And I told you, the audience is dumb. You think they don’t go through screenplays word by word and just point out any minor flaw they can get their greasy hands on?” Kadiri replied, sinking into the nearby loveseat and reaching for her pocket. “Either the audience has to see my lovely face, or I need to be able to start crying. Mind if I smoke?”

Momoka threw her hands up in despair, before rolling her eyes. “You know that shit’ll rot your lungs, right?”

“Sure do. Now can I smoke or not?”

“Ugh- only if you do as I say!”

“Tch… Fine, but don’t say I didn’t say I told you so.” Kadiri stuck a cigarette in her mouth and flicked at her lighter, producing a small flame.

“Don’t set off the smoke alarms, either,” Momoka added as Kadiri took a drag on her cigarette.

Kadiri blew out a puff of smoke, making sure to face _away_ from Momoka, before giving her reply. “ **Now** you tell me about the smoke alarm.”

“You didn’t ask about it.” Momoka leaned over the back of the chair, resting her arms along the top. As Kadiri glanced back, she could have sworn she saw the slightest hints of a smile on her face.

“Whatever. Unless it’s the most sensitive alarm in the world, it won’t go off,” Kadiri asserted. “When’s the next shoot?”

“We lose the full moon in about five hours,” Momoka replied. “So, any time from right now to about four hours from now.”

Kadiri took another puff, blowing another cloud of smoke into the air. “I’ll be ready in fifteen minutes or so.”

“Fine, I’ll send for the makeup team, my cameramen, and another couple of coffees,” Momoka said.

“Just get a coffee for yourself, I’ll be fine.” Kadiri lifted her hand, showing off the cigarette, as Momoka spun around and left to make the calls and reorganise the set.

 

Kadiri sighed as she was left alone again, twisting her wrist around and staring at her cigarette from various different angles.

It wasn’t like she hadn’t heard Momoka’s words before regarding her smoking habit. In fact, it was something nearly every director she’d worked with had pointed out, like she was too stupid to figure out the health risks on her own. That she was just a dumb, beautiful, romanticizable actress unaware of the danger of her habits.

She took another puff, blowing more smoke into the air. How’d those directors even expect the conversation to go? ‘Oh, Nakashima-san! Those cigarettes will rot your lungs and teeth!’

“Golly gee, I’d never considered that! I’ll stop right now!” Kadiri exclaimed out loud in response to her thoughts, her acting dripping with sarcasm despite the room’s emptiness. In almost an instant, the bubbly, idealised personality Kadiri built for her quip vanished, and she sunk back into the chair, as bitter as the lit stick in her hand. “They’re absolute imbeciles if that’s the response they were expecting.”

_It’s not like they had nothing to do with it in the first place._

She knew of alternatives. Gum, nicotine patches, medication. She knew quitting was an option. Or more accurately: these were solutions on paper.

Nicotine patches needed to be hidden from cameras – in some costumes, that was easy. In others, such as the main heroine’s costume in _Sarcophagus of Tutankhamen,_ made it difficult or even impossible. Gum took a lot longer to consume than cigarettes, produced its own problems for her teeth, and contained unneeded calories. Medication? Reporters would easily find the bottles in the trash, find some crap alternative use for them, and start selling her as being in the middle of some major mental instability crisis in her career. And quitting? That could result in her being out of commission for several months while she got that in order. At the height of her fame, she couldn’t manage that.

A buzzing sound came from her pocket. Pulling it out, Kadiri flicked open her phone to see a text from Momoka.

“Get off your ass and get to the set, ASAP.”

Kadiri sighed, putting out her cigarette on the bottom of her shoe and tossing the remnants in the garbage. Unlike medication, the media had already covered and long forgotten her smoking habits. Best done in the beginning, when she was still being forced onto them for energy regulation. She readjusted her hair in a nearby mirror, before heading off to the set.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huuuuge thanks to my boyfriend insightfulMagician for letting me use his OC Momoka Nakame for this part of the challenge!


End file.
